Posted
by
Soulskillon Wednesday March 28, 2012 @02:04PM
from the you've-googled-yourself-8%-more-this-month dept.

An anonymous reader tips news of a new feature announced by Google today: Account Activity. Writing on their official blog, Google's Andreas Tuerk said, "If you sign up, each month we’ll send you a link to a password-protected report with insights into your signed-in use of Google services. For example, my most recent Account Activity report told me that I sent 5 percent more email than the previous month and received 3 percent more. An Italian hotel was my top Gmail contact for the month. I conducted 12 percent more Google searches than in the previous month, and my top queries reflected the vacation I was planning: [rome] and [hotel]." You may remember from earlier this month that Stephen Wolfram began showing some of the extensive personal analytics data he has collected over the past 20 years.

I'm sure your wife would love to know that you're looking for porn 5% more this month.

Pfft! Most women don't care if their guy looks at porn. They just want him to pick up after himself and not sit on the couch after work all night watching TV with his hand in a bag of potato chips. Many marriages are sexless ones, especially after kids are in the picture. So really, while they wouldn't care about their man looking at porn, they'd probably be surprised -- I mean, who has time to masturbate when you've got two screaming kids who, if left unattended for more than 2 minutes will destroy everything you own and ever loved? Nobody, that's who.

I have 2 kids, both of which goto: bed at 8pm (note: 2yo and 7months) when they get older I'm sure that will get moved to 9pm, than 10pm, and once they are 15ish probably midnight. However, I goto bed at 11pm~1am so I've got plenty of time, however kids have caused sex to dramatically decrease, it's not a question of time but energy.

How would that be measured? Comparing time on porn vs nonporn or just time spent on porn month to month? Or would it be an amount of bandwidth type thing? I mean, if some site starts offering higher resolution for the new ipad, that increase would be meaningless!

Um... Anyone who is actually logged into their Google account while searching for porn is a moron.

Yes, but there is no way to logout really. Your browser is leaking your personal information, your IP address doesn't change when you logout, your habits are known, predictable, and that little logon button is about as useful as the interrogator turning off the tape recorder when you ask to go "off the record"... there's still a dozen other microphones in the room that are on, and he can lie as much as he want and it's legal.

We're going to have at least an entire generation that will be unelectable to national office because of pervasive data mining. Everyone will have something that can be turned into a media circus scandal, somewhere in their Internet history.

Then, after we start to see the effects of this we'll all raise a generation of paranoid crypto-nerds and it'll all even out again.

Actually, that sounds kind of fun. Just imagine all of the screaming headlines, as every candidate has to retract everything he/she has ever said or done on the internet. It will turn this depressing, slow descent into fascism into a highly amusing circus. Sure, the country won't be any better off, but it will provide infinitely more amusement (at least, to those of us sardonic types who have a dark sense of humor).

We're going to have at least an entire generation that will be unelectable to national office because of pervasive data mining. Everyone will have something that can be turned into a media circus scandal, somewhere in their Internet history.

Actually, that could be a good thing here in the United States.

Americans are stupid to not only expect, but actually believe that their politicians are a bunch of perfect little angels. They're fucking politicians for crying out loud. But we forget that and miss the contradiction come election time.

In a world where you know politicians are flawed from the start, people might actually care about important issues like policy, campaign bankrollers, and puppetmasters like turdblossom.

1. I like statistics. I work with statistics, reports, business analytics, data mining so it's well within my area of interest.2. The report (as far as I have seen) tells me what I've done and allows me to make things more efficient.3. It provides me with insight of how much does Google know about me. It knows a lot. Do I care? No, not really. I'm not yelling for privacy for the sake of privacy.

(that last point can lead to a really--REALLY long discussion though, so I'd better stop now before it's too late)

You're going through an awful lot of personal lubricant and we've noticed a drop in the number of text messages your Android phone has been receiving from user's we've identified as female. We've added some search suggestions to the box on the right for some singles sites in your area. -- Bro-ogle.

Google has a strong history of not selling personal information. They use it to deliver ads, but they don't expose individual data to the advertisers.

Kids these days don't realize how much better it is. In the old days all of the top 10 ad companies would sell all your private info to to anybody. Google has changed the game and changed the level of privacy and transparency people expect in all the online services.

In the old days all of the top 10 ad companies would sell all your private info to to anybody. Google has changed the game and changed the level of privacy and transparency people expect in all the online services.

By now, doesn't Google OWN the top 10 ad companies? I mean, they bought DoubleClick (probably the biggest and most notorios offender), and they have AdMob (largest presence for mobile devices, Android AND iOS), and probably own the other ad companies as well...

how can they collect anymore data on me. They've already got eveything possible. Now if they could just emulate me on/. then it'd be possible for them to bring to my attention the good ones and answer the damn idiots with RTFA/RTFM and such. Hell it could problably troll better them me

Google does not sell the info, it uses it. If anything, selling info would hurt them as they lose some of their competitive advantage. They would be the buyers of such info in the greater scheme. Targeted ads with higher purchases makes advertisement much more lucrative in that they can charge more for the same number of views. Being able to show ads of exactly what you want to buy is a very important thing in order to increase the ability of how much they are able to charge companies.

Google is in the midst of an effort to inform people about privacy. Not by saying "hey, listen up" and then dictating information to them, but by doing everything they can to get people to look at Google's own use of data and the rules they set for themselves around privacy. All those times when they kept telling us that their privacy policy had changed? Yeah, that's a part of it. Also, for those in urban envionments who take the L, T, Subway, Metro, whatever...you've probably seen the ads explaining at a high level how they use the data they collect to personalize search results. Now this is the next step: giving them the opportunity to see how analytics work in a way that is relevant to their understanding, and to their own lives.

The big problem with privacy isn't that people aren't getting it...it's that people aren't demanding it. But until they know what privacy really is (no, it's not security) and how it works, that won't change. Until they actually pay attention to what is being done with their own information, how can we expect an uproar over the abuse of it? That's what Google is up to now, and I commend them for it. They are playing a VERY forward-thinking game, and are truly acting in the best interests of the common good.

Google is in the midst of an effort to inform people about privacy. Not by saying "hey, listen up" and then dictating information to them, but by doing everything they can to get people to look at Google's own use of data and the rules they set for themselves around privacy. All those times when they kept telling us that their privacy policy had changed? Yeah, that's a part of it. Also, for those in urban envionments who take the L, T, Subway, Metro, whatever...you've probably seen the ads explaining at a high level how they use the data they collect to personalize search results. Now this is the next step: giving them the opportunity to see how analytics work in a way that is relevant to their understanding, and to their own lives.

The big problem with privacy isn't that people aren't getting it...it's that people aren't demanding it. But until they know what privacy really is (no, it's not security) and how it works, that won't change. Until they actually pay attention to what is being done with their own information, how can we expect an uproar over the abuse of it? That's what Google is up to now, and I commend them for it. They are playing a VERY forward-thinking game, and are truly acting in the best interests of the common good.

hmm... I guess google reads/. too. Wonder how long it took for them to word this message just how they wanted it, before it was posted.

I have never opted-in or clicked 'yes' on any agreement with Google. Why are they collecting my search data?

Because you send it to them every time you use them? Because they've always been clear about what they are collecting and how they use it? Because, as far as anyone can tell, they adhere to their policy that they collect and use data, but do not sell that data to others?

If you don't want them to collect your search data, don't use them. You can use another search provider, probably with a worse privacy policy, or you can write your own. Or use one of the many systems which use google while hiding your i

Do you realise that an ethical faction of the advertising industry itself is behind Ghostery [evidon.com]?

FTFY

Ghostery provides reports to Evidon about advertisers and data collectors, which Evidon then provides to advertising industry groups including the Better Business Bureau (BBB) and the Direct Marketing Association, parts of the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA). These agencies then use those reports to monitor how Online Behavioral Advertisers operate and, when needed, refer them to the Federal Trade Commission.

This is a great business model. Offer a free service to the benefit of consumers; Use ser